Medical technology

Light at the end of the tunnel

Taking the heat out of gynaecological examinations

FOR women living in the rich world, gynaecological examinations may be uncomfortable and undignified, but they are, at least, effective. Their poor-world sisters, however, do not have things so easy. In many places, a lack of electricity means that cervical examinations are carried out haphazardly by candlelight. Since there are almost 400,000 new cases of cervical cancer in poor countries each year, a better way of doing things would be welcome.

Fidelma O'Mahony, a gynaecologist at the North Staffordshire Hospital, in Britain, and her colleagues, think they have invented one. Inspired by the growing range of clockwork gadgets (radios, torches and so on) designed for use in places without mains electricity, they have come up with a hand-cranked device that can be used to examine a woman's cervix for signs of cancer.

The device, described in a paper published recently in BioMed Central Women's Health, an online research journal, is an adaptation of a commercially available clockwork torch (flashlight). This torch works by storing energy in a hand-wound spring, and then using that energy to drive a dynamo. The electricity produced illuminates a bulb. Dr O'Mahony's insight was to add a fibre-optic cable to carry light from the bulb to the interior of the vagina. The other end of the cable clips on to an instrument known as a speculum, which is used to keep the vagina open during the examination. The result is a beam that can be directed accurately at features of interest.

Tests have shown that this arrangement for illuminating the cervix is better than either a candle or an angle-poise lamp. Charging the device up is hard work: six hours of winding yields 2½ hours of useful light. But that is enough for 12-15 examinations. A little elbow-grease from their men-folk could thus keep women-folk in better health.